The Disappearance of Saturday Morning 838
Ant writes "Saturday morning no longer means kids in front of TV sets across the country, glued to the latest in hip cartoons. Why? Gerard Raiti investigates the death of an era." As a former Saturday morning TV addict, this doesn't seem like a bad thing to me.
Mmmm infomercials^H^H^H^^H^H^H^^H^H^Hcartoons (Score:2, Insightful)
A new Era (Score:4, Insightful)
Then agian, some kids just sleep in
Remember nothing (Score:2, Insightful)
cartoons (Score:1, Insightful)
It is because of all Cartoon networks (Score:5, Insightful)
I was glued to the Transformers in the 80s. There is nothing as good on now. End of an era.
No cartoon violence == less fun (Score:5, Insightful)
Because children don't enjoy boring PC bullshit. I'll bet the little rugrats would tune in to the old WB cartoons, dynamite gags and all.
Re:Remember nothing (Score:5, Insightful)
The classics (Score:5, Insightful)
isn't what it used to be (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe it was just the time I grew up in, but the good shows aren't on anymore.
(And by the good shows I mean Rocco's Modern Life, Garfield and Friends, and other such shows that were a satire of current popular and political views [hey, maybe I was an overly smart nerd as a young'un too].)
Nowadays, the stuff on TV just isn't attractive. Not on Saturday mornings, afternoons, or even nighttime (except for toonami midnight run, which is pretty old stuff anyway). It seems as though there is less and less of a reason to watch TV at all anymore. The only things recently that I've even remembered the show times for were 24 (the drama that takes place one hour per episode) and Trigun (toonami).
Maybe it's just me, but TV doesn't hold my attention enough for me to keep watching it.
[...reading atricle...]
Ok it says the internet is a major factor in the decline of TV viewing. They have me on that point (damn you slashdot). Also, I forgot to take into account the whole "job" thing with the working or sleeping through the mornings.
[...last attempt at being right the first time around...]
Meh, I still think if they put something on that captivated me enough I would make time to watch it.
Saturday Mornings (Score:2, Insightful)
These days, you're lucky if I get out of bed, much less JUMP out of bed. Breakfast no longer happens either. Eh, I guess I grew up.
lost specialness (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't think cartoons are a bad thing, and I cherished my Saturday morning cartoon watching time. It taught me the value of patience, and the value of privledge. If I was bad during the week, then guess what, my cherished time of cartoon watching would be revoked.
Unlike today, I don't think parents tended to use the television as some kind of electronic babysitter. The television on the whole just wasn't entertaining to children most of the time, so instead of a crutch it was used as a reward tool. In this way, I think the Saturday morning cartoon era was much more valuable to the youth that experienced it than today's pacifier approach.
Don't want to deal with the kids? Turn on Cartoon Network. Yuck.
The end of an era (Score:5, Insightful)
Anyway, this really does seem like the end of an era to me. Admittedly I was a Saturday morning cartoon addict. I liked Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Inspector Gadget, and all those other great cartoons of those days. What happened? This article attempts to explain what, but I just don't buy it. I don't think that there has been a lack of quality television programming these days. I just think that kids are getting involved in something more immersive - for better or worse - that is taking them away from cartoons and thus drying up the market.
What am I talking about? Videogames! In my youth the SNES was the coolest videogame system anyone I knew had. It was also very expensive. I remember how we all congregated at the house of the one kid in my neighborhood who owned it to play Street Fighter. But that wasn't Saturday morning - that was weekdays, after school.
Nowadays, however, videogame systems are cheap and prevalent. Heck, my SIX YEAR OLD nephew has a PlayStation and a GameBoy Advance. I would estimate he plays games at least two hours a day. That's time he probably would've spent watching TV anyway. Is this a good thing or a bad thing? All I know is, kids these days are getting exposed to videogames very early on in life.
I was babysitting my cousin recently. We were playing Gauntlet: Dark Legacy together on my PS2. I thought he would suck. I was wrong. He wasn't amazingly good, but he's better than my father. This, from a kid who can't really even read! The kids these days, they're just intuitively "getting" videogames. My dad sucks at action games. He's very good at strategy games though. And this new generation, for better or worse, is highly trained in electronics.
I suppose the electronizing of our nation's youth is a good thing. That's the way the future's headed. I just feel sad, though, that the closest thing they'll experience to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are the cheap knock-off games for GameBoy whose sole good quality is the license they obtained. The cartoons, even though non-interactive, were at least better.
Any thoughts?
Re:The classics (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh well.
Sleep, blessed sleep (Score:5, Insightful)
You're not a parent, are you?
Seriously. I never used the TV as a babysitter but the Glass Teat did have it's use on Saturday morning. After putting in an 80 hour, five day week an extra few hours to sleep on that one critical day was, well, critical. The Saturday morning cartoons were something for my little sweetie to do instead of prying my eyelids up and asking me to entertain her at six in the morning. And I didn't have to worry about what she might be watching because I *knew* what was on, on every channel ( we didn't have quite so many of them in those days).
In times when I wasn't working quite so hard, or at all, we'd watch Danger Mouse together every afternoon, then go out and play, and read books after dinner and most Saturday mornings would find us in the car going somewhere neat.
But in those times when I was working that hard Saturday morning cartoons were a gift from God and the only thing that kept me alive, and sane. Probably kept her alive too.
KFG
Re:What about classic cartoons? (Score:3, Insightful)
I hear you, man! From the article, some of the reasons for the change:
a poorer quality of animation, and a greater emphasis on family time.
Please! The quality of cartoons took a huge dive in the 70's and 80's and those who think that the the quality of animation is poorer today, is looking at the past with rosy colored glasses.
Yogi Bear, Godzilla (ack!),Snagglepus, Atomic Ant, the Tom and Jerry from the age (the oroginals are *classic*) and the many derivatives and re-packaging such as The Jetsons, Galaxy Goofups gave the impression that Hanna Barbera had a crap factory somewhere.
But my main peeve was the cartoons that ended on a "moral footnote": He-Man, She-Ra, Thundercats, G.I. Joe, Silverhawks...
Plus, who needs saturday morning cartoons when you have 24 hours toon channels, such as Cartoon Network and Fox Kids.
.... Courage the Cowardly Dog, now *that*'s funny.
Re:What about classic cartoons? (Score:3, Insightful)
cartoons nowadays are crap
unoriginal and just plain unentertaning.
truly, nothing beats the merry melodies of times gone by.
and what memories they are. sure they wre violent, but everyone laughed then, everyone knwe they were jokes.
no we have tv, movies, and NEWS conveying violence to kids that is just so much more believeable and true to life.
and people blame the games and cartoons.
have you turned on the tv lately? notice how much violence and gore is glorified? no wonder we have such fucked up kids today - we plaster the most dsiturbing incidents right on the front page.
go ahead, ask yourself hwo is truly to blame.
and damn did i get way off topic
Re:I miss them so much (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:What about classic cartoons? (Score:5, Insightful)
Most WWII ones have politically incorrect Japanese or German characters. In other words, they are damn funny, and P2P is really the only way to get them these days.
Unfortunately, it seems that banned-cartoon afficionados never heard of MPEG4, so most are 100+MB MPEG1/2 files and on slow hosts. The quality often leaves something to be desired.
Anyhow, classic cartoons are still aired on Cartoon Network... Not as much as I think they should be, but if you've got a Tivo, you could accumulate quite a few just setting it to record the Chuck Jones/Tex Avery 30min shows. Rip 'em to Divx and pass 'em around on CD and the Internet for the less fortunate.
Saturday Morning (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The classics (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:The real reason (Score:5, Insightful)
Being slashdotted as I type (Score:5, Insightful)
(can't read other three pages:(
This is not necessarily a good thing, despite what timothy implies. One of the reasons cited for the decline is parents having to 'fill' the time. Why are they doing that? Divorce. Each parent is trying to make up for only having half time with their kids. For some reason, other parents feel that Johnny and Susie have to be in soccer (scouts, swimming, etc.) as well. Having overly complicated lives is something that adults can barely cope with without the use of alcohol, Prozac, and other drugs. Why should we expect 8 year olds to be able to cope?
Oh, they're going to learn socialization skills. Bull. Did everyone forget 'Lord of the Flies'? Those are the type of socialization skills kids learn when left to their own devices. What's wrong with a bit of leisure on the weekends, particularly for children? 'All work and no play...'
So let them play outside, whether it's ball, gardening (some kids dig it, no pun intended), or whatever. But why not wake up Saturday morning and decide what to do? That's fine, for the more temperate months. But in the depths of summer, hiding out in the basement is a good thing. In the winter, sitting in front of the fire isn't bad. But what to do?
Read? That's nice, but do you *always* feel like reading? No. Look at the number of people already who have lamented the loss of classic WB cartoons. There's something there. It's simple entertainment. What's wrong with that?
Internet? It's just as non-interactive as the TV.
Video Games? Not sure how this is a better use of time. Perhaps timothy can fill us in? (Note, I'm not saying it's bad, I'm just saying it's no better than TV.)
The death of Saturday morning cartoons is not something to necessarily cheer about. Look at the causes ('non-traditional' families, turning kids into little adults) and lament the occurence.
More Channels = Less Restriction on Viewing Times (Score:2, Insightful)
In the 80s, cable TV only had what, 30 channels? Nowadays the numbers are in the low hundreds and growing. Since there were so few channels to serve such a broad spectrum of interests, the 'Saturday morning' was born to cater to kids who'd be up early while their parents slept in. Later on in the day, they'd switch over to '100 Huntley Street' and all the boring 'grown-up' religion shows.
Nowadays, there is no need for this. There are several all-day cartoon networks, and dozens of kid-specific networks. On-demand Pay Per View kid movies help too. Cartoons are no longer limited to Saturday morning because there's more channels, more availability, and more kids watching all day long.
Re:What about classic cartoons? (Score:2, Insightful)
The cartoons now suck, plain and simple. (Score:1, Insightful)
Cartoon Network doesn't seem to run a lot of the old Bugs Bunny stuff that I remember-- the cartoons where the characters smoke or get killed seem to have been phased out, since kids these days are dumber and their parents are more sue-happy and ready to point fingers. But I did actually watch an entire 30 minutes of Tom and Jerry, and at age 29 they were still making me laugh out loud. I tried the same with an episode of G.I. Joe, but that didn't work. My suspension of disbelief no longer works when I see the Cobra jets blown into a few million dime-sized pieces but somehow the pilot always manages to get out successfully.
~Philly
The Golden Age (Score:5, Insightful)
It doesn't seem a big surprise to see Saturday morning TV cartoons imploding, since 25 years ago the best things on were from 30 years before that, and not designed for TV.
Re:What about classic cartoons? (Score:5, Insightful)
In the lead-up to Iraq, I kept waiting for somebody to show the cartoon where all the mice (allies) ganged up on the cat (hitler) and when the cat was defeated the peace activist mouse tried to join in the victory song and got hit with something. Whether you agree with that POV or not, it's a classic cartoon.
Then there's the one where they build the skyscraper to the tune of a familiar classical work, and at the end 3 bricks fall on some poor animals head in time with the last 3 notes. If you know classic cartoons, you know the one I'm talking about.
And of course, there were all the cartoons made during WWII, much of which went over my head until I learned about the war, then I saw the cartoons again and it was like... OHHHH... so that's what Bugs Bunny was talking about with the "A-Sticker". Or how about the one where the ambulance pulls up and takes the rubber tire and leaves the dying patient? It was just silliness until my Dad told me about the rubber shortage during the war; but that was the great thing about it--it worked as commentary on the shortage, but it also worked as silly humor apart from any knowledge of what was happening. Did the makers of that cartoon hope it would stand the test of time, or was it just dumb luck?
Then there were some that were just great glimpses into the 30s and 40s that had nothing to do with war. Remember the one where all the people go in to "win a car" and they all come out with cars and the whole city pulses to some Latin rhythm? Just good clean fun. Or how about the one where the frightened little mouse runs away from the church and meets frightening characters like Nick O'Tine the cigarette? Yep, even back then we had a love-hate relationship with tobacco... but you'd never know any of this if you hadn't seen classic cartoons.
You don't have to go back to the 30s and 40s either. Why not roll Schoolhouse Rock once in a while?
As to what happened, I dunno. Disney syndrome? I don't think so. If that were the case, we'd at least see overpriced VHS tapes being pitched on TV (call now, operators are standing by...) and I haven't seen it. Maybe they tried that, and failed.
And what's more, there's a lot of more obscure stuff out there. They should re-run it in theatres. One of the best times I ever had in a theatre was in college when they ran a bouncing-ball cartoon. Remember those? Nobody had seen one in years. The next day, we would clap our hands and sing "deep in the heart of Texas" and it was like an inside joke. People thought we were crazy... actually, we kinda were.
Re:What about classic cartoons? (Score:5, Insightful)
I agree with you - but I have to twist it a bit. Chuck Jones, while catrching all the Bugs-buzz these days, is also partly responsible for reducing the quality of the cartoons as well. Remember Bugs in his hey-day, back in the Fritz Freeling era? This is the time I would call "peak-Bugs" - characters like Bugs, Daffy, Yosemite Sam and Foghorn (even the Chicken Hawk) were refined and perfect ploys for the plot. Everything spun perfectly because the balance between animation and character. You can't compare "Buccanner Bunny" or "Baseball Bugs" with anything else...they are so completly wrapped up in the individuality of Bugs that no other character could do them. And they're deeper and richer experiences for it.
I feel Chuck's years were different though - wonderfully experimental and innovative, but in some ways also the point in which the quality of the animation began it's decline. Bugs and Co. became flatter, more square-headded and ragged-edged, as if BB was morphing to Road Runner edginess.
Character also took a big step backwards too - it became more a sticom. Or worse - the late 50 and 60's garishness invaded the cartoons. Colors became more electric and abstract. Cartoonists also began to play with the idea of a cartoon - the Dot and the Line (I've never been a fan of that one), Bugs battling the animator with an erasor (where I betcha you could watch it, and just swap Daffy for Bugs and never know the difference - the individual character of each was blended and lost).
Don't get me wrong - I like Jones, but I don't think he was the saviour of cartoons as recent history tells. (But then I'd NEVER allow Hollywood to write history - it's all fashion and fad in their eyes...but that's another screed)
Jones was a classisist and modernist, and I would say he refined the visual style of the cartoons, leading the way for modern Saturday Morning fare. He did for the movies what another cartoonist of that same time did for print - Charles Schultz & "Peanuts" - they eliminated the noise and fluff, and focused on the the center of the events, reducing the cartoon to a kind of visual haiku. I believe Schultz was more sucessful because with a daily publication he was able to keep the character of Charlie Brown more-or-less intact. On the other hand, Bugs, Daffy, Speedy Gonzolez et al became more interchangeable, more "component" in nature and so less successful.
The best cartoons were never taken seriously (Score:5, Insightful)
things like bugs bunny and yosemite sam blowing holes in each other's hats, then running from each other and bugs beating the crap out of sam through various dirty tricks.
the late 1950s was the end of the great cartoon era. They were written for an adult audience, and often shown before movies to get folks' attention on the screen. Movie trailers now do this.
[offtopic]
I long for the days when there were still parts of one's life that were not saturated with advertisements. the only part of my life not saturated with ads is my dreams, and as soon as the technology exists to put ads in my dreams, they'll be there. I hope I'm dead.
[/offtopic]
When cartoons were not taken seriously, and considered entertainment only, is when cartoons were great. Nowadays cartoons like Dexter's Laboratory and The Powerpuff Girls are good cartoons, but they'll never be as good as the WWII and babyboom era Warner Bros cartoons.
I saw an interview once with some animators from that era of Warner animation studios' life, and they all said that they wrote and drew the cartoons that *they* wanted to see, not what someone else wanted to see. Nowadays executives decide what is written and drawn, in an attempt to please the most people possible, and keep their ad revenue up. it is my belief that all bad decisions are based on the desire for more money, and this is yet another example of that form of decision making.
Anyway, ranting off. The cartoons will get great again when they study what psychology made the old warner bros cartoons great, and reproduce it. talking rabbits, ducks, dogs, roosters, squirrels, etc, with jokes and situations written for adults and silly fake violence written for children. then they'll be great again. I would love to see one cartoon character jump into a freaking burning coal stove on a train and find a huge party inside just one more time. I would also love to see a good old fashioned shootout in a dusty old frontier town, between a talking, wise-ass rabbit that walks on two legs and a stupid gun-happy gold miner just one more time. "i dare you to step across this line" said 4,000 times until sam is led into walking off of a cliff. doesn't get much better than that.
oh, the good old fashioned crazyness will never be repeated!
Re:The classics (Score:3, Insightful)
It isn't the quality, that's for sure... (Score:1, Insightful)
I think the comments that cable has killed Saturday morning cartoons are more on the mark. Not just because cable offers 24/7 programming, but because what is on offer is really first rate in comparison. Nickelodeon, for instance, has brought us such gems as Rocko's Modern Life, Ren and Stimpy, and Invader Zim to name a few. There is just no comparison imo - the programming the cable channels are offering up is much classier and proves you don't have to pander or use sledgehammer wit to produce children's programming.
Re:Dragon Ball Z. (Score:2, Insightful)
I still have tons of original X-Men episodes on tape. One of my little brothers (who's about 5 at the time of this writing) thoroughly enjoys watching them every chance he gets. At least he's being raised with good music and cartoons as opposed to the trash that is most of Cartoon Network's programming.
When I told my parents that two of my roommates had never heard Depeche Mode, they were simply stunned. Too many people aren't being exposed to the bands that have shaped modern music. The same goes for cartoons. The X-Men series was a work of art. To truly appreciate cartoons, you simply must watch the classics. Plus, once you have, it's so much fun to start listing the older cartoons from which modern ones rip directly.
Re:Remember nothing (Score:3, Insightful)
Saturday morning died (Score:2, Insightful)
*Mighty Mouse was cancelled by the PMRC, because of a flower sniffing episode.
Re:It is because of all Cartoon networks (Score:5, Insightful)
Have you tried watching some of those old Transformers cartoons? If you have, you'll realize that no, they really aren't good, it's just that your tastes were different back then.
Re:The classics (Score:4, Insightful)
thad
Re:What about classic cartoons? (Score:5, Insightful)
Where things got stupid, IMO, is when the adults got stupid about cartoons. Everything started sliding when someone declared that Road Runner and Coyote cartoons were too violent. I'm quite certain that kids understand Coyote is his own worst enemy. I'm pretty certain it's clear that you can't push your brother off a cliff somewhere in a Southwestern desert, and expect him to live. The only people who have troubles with such distinctions are moronic do-gooding adults.
-Paul Komarek
Re:What about classic cartoons? (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm not enough of a connoisseur to agree or disagree, but one thing I that I've noticed/heard about the Chuck Jones era was the quality of the animation. Say what you will about the characters and stories, but the vistas of the Road Runner and especially the expresiveness of the eyes is amazing.
During his tenure, very slight changes in facial features spoke volumes about the characters emotions, most especially in the "villains." Rememeber the look that Elmer Fudd or Wile E. Coyote got on their face before the inevitable _____? The little turn of the eyes, how they shrank, and got kind of sad. Full-feature Disney movie characters rarely have such "acting" talent.
Forget Chuck Jones and Hanna-Barbera... (Score:5, Insightful)
Even better than the Warner Bros. releases, however, were the Fleischer Studios offerings. Betty Boop has become a global cultural icon in a way that Bugs Bunny and Company - let alone any of the current crop - simply can't touch. (And nobody but nobody could get away with naming a character "Bimbo" these days, unless you're a Mexican bakery.) Fleischer Studios did several musical numbers themselves, many starring the vocal talents of Cab Calloway. Max Fleischer and his brother also invented a piece of technology that's still in use for animation today - the rotoscope. It allowed them to capture real motion, which is why so much of their animation had a "surreally real" look and feel.
Personally, I think that the demise of Saturday Morning Television has less to do with the internet, cable, or "quality time" than with the fact that even 20 years ago, people gave kids more credit for intelligence and mental toughness. We are seeing the most rabid romanticism of childhood to occur since the Victorian era. On one hand, children are being painted as delicate little creatures with easily damaged psyches; and heaven forbid that they should be exposed to anything that could mold them in a disturbing way. On the other hand, you have advertisers who pander to the pre-pubescent smartass by portraying kids as being infinitely wittier and more intelligent than any of the adults around them (if you buy X product.) [aside] And people then wonder why their precious child pops off to Grandma. Why? because the commercials, obnoxious as they are, are more fun to watch than the PC pap that passes for a cartoon these days.[/aside] Kids should have things filtered, to an extent. But don't insult their intelligence. They're lots smarter than people think.
I watched all of those violent cartoons, and not once did I try to bicycle off of the roof, or drop an anvil from my perch in the tree onto my cousin's head. (Blocks and Nerf balls are another story.) Heck I even read my father's National Lampoons, although that might not be the best example to use if I intend to paint myself as a reasonably well-adapted adult.
In a nutshell, I am going to find as many of the old cartoons as I can. That way, when I do have kids, we can sit and watch them together. I'll get to re-live some darn good memories, and the munchkins will have an appreciation for what the good stuff looks like.
Another Merrie Melodies link.
And a very well done research book.
Further information about Max Fleischer's early work.
My two cents (Score:2, Insightful)
Just my two cents. Gods bless the Cartoon Network for saving a lot of these shows.
Re:What about classic cartoons? (Score:5, Insightful)
This switch forgets that kids live in a world filled with adults, and tho they may not get all the complex jokes, they do recognise when they're being talked down to. And making cartoons "kid-level" takes away the kid's incentive to pay attention so he gets all the nuances. IOW, they become uninteresting, so the kid loses interest. Once that happens, you never get the kid back.
Kids aren't near as stupid as some adults think. Write a good clean cartoon with complex humour that an adult can appreciate, and it'll keep the kids' interest better too.
Survey question: What was your fave cartoon as a kid? and as an adult?
A: Bullwinkle, and A: Bullwinkle. Why? See above.
Re:What about classic cartoons? (Score:5, Insightful)
Kids also generally understand what's fantasy and what's not, more than adults often realise. A few kids will believe cartoon physics are real, but a few adults believe impossible things too, so it's not just a kid thing.
Re:Remember nothing (Score:4, Insightful)
Some of the older cartoons, particularly Warner Bros. cartoons like Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, etc. were targeted at all age groups. The writers were clever enough to include slapstick action for the kids and haughty real-world or old movie references that the adults could laugh at. There were frequent references to Casablanca, Mae West, Cary Grant, et al. There's really alot of depth and love crafted into those cartoons.
I just did some research and found this fascinating page. http://members.aol.com/EOCostello/ Read up on it and you'll discover alot of goodies packed into those old cartoons.
Just be careful. You may find yourself watching them again soon.
Re:Remember nothing (Score:3, Insightful)
Note that this is coming out of a man whose primary preferences as far as movies and television are along the lines of MASH, Shakespeare (which for all you collegiate types who seem to think it is to be read rather than watched, are plays and intended to be watched as such rather than read), and other various shows and films that the average 5 year old who is targeted by these audiences will almost certainly not really understand.
Tying yourself to one target-age will not make you any smarter.
Re:Retarded cartoons (Score:4, Insightful)
Spounge Bob Sqaure Pants?
I was actually surprised that Sponge Bob didn't get censored to oblivion. That show is COOL. IN fact, my wife watched it with my daughter once (back when we had a tv, and we actually had cable) and told me it was a bad show, too much violence and other crap. She's one of those mothers. Luckily, i don't put up with that crap. So I told her to put on Sponge Bob when it came back on and show me where she had problems with it. Would you know? She couldn't find any problems with it. Moreover, we both found it to be really really funny, and a lot of fun to watch with the kids.
Occasionally I think about getting cable again to watch that show, but then I get real again. Dammit, TV just plain sucks. What do my kids do on saturday morning? They go out with their mother while I sleep. :) Then they come home and play with me for awhile, then we all go outside and play together.
probably VCD format (Score:3, Insightful)
They might be in VCD format so you can burn and watch on a real television with the help of a DVD player.
Sure, an uber-hot divx formatted cartoon would be great and all, but I doubt these people have access to the originals and it would be a waste of effort to take low-quality television video (or more likely second or third generation VHS as these episodes are no longer broadcasted) and put it in huge high-quality divx-like formatting.
When it comes to television broadcast stuff, VCD is a good way to go. A simple burn and off to the TV you go. Yeah, you can take divx or whatever and reformat it or you might might own a nice videocard that does NTSC output, but my shared folders on P2P are usually for me first and others second.
Be glad you're able to get anything.
>Anyhow, classic cartoons are still aired on Cartoon Network.
True, but the WWII ones certainly are not getting played on CN.
Re:I used to love Saturday morning cartoons... (Score:5, Insightful)
Not very ethical however. Its a shame that these people represent believers in Jesus to so many people.
They are like the crackers of hackers. Crackers give hackers a bad name but they are a very small percentage of hackers. Same with greedy televangelists. They give Christianity a bad name, but are a very small percentage of Christians.
Jesus knocked over the tables of the "money changers" in the Temple. He definately does not approve of fraudulent televangelism.
Re:Dragon Ball Z. (Score:2, Insightful)
In fact, it's still pretty popular. They still air it regularly at odd times here in Japan.
However, they NEVER show Dragonball GT.
Re:What about classic cartoons? (Score:5, Insightful)
I agree with your thesis, but not with some of your examples. The Flintstones were a cartoon version of The Honeymooners, with Fred mapping to Ralph Kramden and Barney to Ed Norton etc. It originally aired from 1960 to 1966, in prime time if I remember rightly. The Jetsons started in 1962.
Fundamentally, though, you're right. When you write for, bud don't pander to, children, the results are things such as Tom Sawyer, Watership Down, and A Wrinkle in Time. When you pander to children, you get Barney--the mind-sucking Purple Hellwyrm.
Cartoons now-a-days are c&%p (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:What about classic cartoons? (Score:5, Insightful)
You're forgetting something important. A show that "keeps the kids' interest better" will be cancelled, unless it's also driving toy sales. Obviously, "keeping the kids' interest" is not the primary goal of the people who produce cartoons. Cartoons nowadays are basically just infomercials.
I'm one of THOSE parents (Score:3, Insightful)
But, there are several reasons why we don't let them watch cartoons on TV:
1) They are a waste of time.
2) They are "mind-swill".
3) They are a primary means of marketing toys and teaching my kids rampant materialism. I want my kids to want a toy because they see it and think it is cool or useful, not because they were mesmerized by a commercial to buy it.
4) It is too passive. I'd rather have them playing with their toys together inside, or playing with their friends outside.
5) They can always read more books.
I've discussed these things with my kids, and they understand them, but they still want to watch the cartoons. When they do get a chance to watch them (like when they go to grandpa's house... he lives in Iowa, and TV watching doesn't seem to be such a looked-down on thing there), I usually let them get away with watching a few hours of them on a Saturday morning, hoping they will get it out of their systems.
I think my kids have become the better for it. I think they are better rounded than most kids their ages.
dochood
Cartoons haven't left, they've moved (Score:2, Insightful)
As for kids cartoons, there's plenty of great stuff out there, it's just all living on cable now. And there is way less of the mindless crap that so many here have tried to wax nostalgic over, like He-Man and Transformers. Woah! you want to know what killed Saturday morning? Look no further than that kind of "design the toy and then make up a show to market it" junk.
You list those as "classics"? (Score:3, Insightful)
That's like a list about the debasement of the kid cartoon, not about the classics. You were on the cusp of the every-show-is-an-excuse-to-push-action-figures generation, but not quite there yet. Transformers was actually over the edge... Not that the production values were so bad, with Orson Welles in the movie and all, but that was well on the way to Pokemon.
"Classics" would be Wagner's Ring Cycle as done by Bugs and Elmer, not Voltron.
Re:Hanna-Barbara (Score:2, Insightful)
What Hanna Barbara brought to modern cartoons was a way to speed up the process of animation so that they could come up with a weekly television series. Before that, you either had people making 10 minute shorts to display before the main feature of a movie, or you had Disney working years to make a full length animated movie. Either of these products had to appeal to a mass audience. Hanna Barbara is obviously cheaper quality, but they were the ones who learned where you can put the cheats. When Fred runs down a hallway, you know he is going to pass by the same potted plant a half-dozen times.
Now that people learned what sort of shortcuts were or weren't noticed, cartoons could be written in a way to
avoid too many expensive options, or techniques could be developed to mitigate them.
Comparing cartoons made for television against cartoons made for theaters is like comparing movie comedies against sitcoms. Its like trying to compare "National Lampoon's Vacation" to "King of Queens".
Re:What about classic cartoons? (Score:5, Insightful)
Too much commercialization (Score:4, Insightful)
I won't pretend that it was all great and there were no marketting tie-ins. I don't remember which came first - He-man action figures or the cartoon. I remember the saturday morning supercade - which was Pacman, Q*bert, Dirk the Daring and other video game tie ins when that was hot. I remember several cartoons based around the video craze at the start of MTV.
But it seems that the commercialization/advertising started to come first. Where He-man/GI Joe could probably stand on it's own, now it seems that if there wasn't a product tie in, the show would have never existed.
I don't know why NBC, CBS, and ABC got out of it. Perhaps they figured they'd make more money selling ads to gillette than mattel. Perhaps with the competition from cable stations digging into other profits, funding these cartoons was no longer profitiable.
I do know that while the old stuff may not have been the greatest (THe Snorks anyone?) the new stuff seems to be even worse. The animation REALLY sucks (oh...I suppose it's just being artistic in a way I don't understand) and I really don't like my girls watching too much of the stuff on Cartoon Network. The disney channel has some good stuff on - though sometimes it does get a little to edutainment like. Rolie Polie Olie is probably one of the best shows on now that reminds me of the old stuff...decent animation, interesting stories (well...as interesting as a show aimed for 3-4 year olds can be)
Oh yeah...my daughters current favorite - The Challenge of the Superfriends DVD I found at Wal-mart, followed by Scooby and Tom and Jerry - guess the old stuff still stands the test of time.
Wow...I rambled...
Re:Saturday cartoons? Why, you have ballet classes (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Remember nothing (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Remember nothing (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Saturday cartoons? Why, you have ballet classes (Score:3, Insightful)
The same thing applies now. Saturday is my day to sleep in, but often I don't. That's fine as long as it's my choice when I get up and not my wife's or daughter's.